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Health Officials Use Flu Shot Season to Prepare for Disasters

Michael Pope

Health officials across Virginia are bracing for the worst while also helping people feel their best.

Warning! Warning! A strange and mysterious illness is gripping Virginia. Health officials across the Commonwealth are scrambling to figure out a way to vaccinate millions of people.

OK, relax. It’s just a disaster planning scenario. But it’s one that allows health officials like Zvi Gruenspecht to administer free flu shots while also conducting disaster planning scenarios.

“The basics of the scenario this year are an unusual spike in flu. It’s determined that it’s a novel strain of influenza but one for which a vaccine is available.”

He’s the public health emergency management coordinator in Alexandria, where health director Stephen Haering says persuading people they should get vaccines requires striking a delicate balance.

“There are extremes on either side, people being very complacent or apathetic or mistrusting and not following recommendation. And then there’s the other extreme of people being hyper-vigilant or overly anxious and concerned.”

The disaster planning flu shot clinics are being held in all 34 health districts using $200,000 of federal grant money to purchase 20,000 doses and supplies to administer the vaccines.

This report, provided by Virginia Public Radio, was made possible with support from the Virginia Education Association.

Michael Pope is an author and journalist who lives in Old Town Alexandria.